Leonard Pitts, Jr.

Columnist

Leonard Pitts Jr. joined The Miami Herald in 1991 as its pop music critic and has penned a syndicated column focusing on pop culture, social issues and family life since 1994. Leonard Pitts is the author of six books, his latest, "Becoming Dad: Black Men and the Journey to Fatherhood," was published in 1999.

Pitts has been writing professionally since 1976 when, as an 18-year-old college student, he began writing freelance reviews and profiles for Soul, a national black entertainment tabloid. In 1978, he became its editor. In the years since, Pitts' work has appeared in such publications as Musician, Spin, TV Guide, Reader's Digest and Parenting. In addition, he wrote, produced and syndicated "Who We Are," an award-winning 1988 radio documentary on the history of black America, and has written and produced numerous other radio programs on subjects as diverse as Madonna and Martin Luther King, Jr. Pitts was also a writer for radio's popular countdown program, "Casey's Top 40 with Casey Kasem."

Leonard Pitts is a four-time winner of the American Association of Sunday and Feature Editors' Award for Excellence in Commentary, a five-time winner of the National Headliners Award given by the Press Club of Atlantic City, and a six-time winner of the Green Eyeshade Award given by the Society of Professional Journalists. The Florida Society of Newspaper Editors, the National Association of Black Journalists, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the American Society of Newspaper Editors, Editor and Publisher magazine and GLAAD Media, among others, have also honored him. In 2002, the National Society of Newspaper Columnists awarded Pitts its inaugural Columnist of the Year award, and in 2004 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for commentary.

Recent Articles

It happened because a white man was scared. Chase Coleman was on a park road, probably lost and confused, having straggled far behind the pack — he's a cross-country runner from Syracuse, N.Y. — when the white man got out of his car and shoved him. A witness said Chase flew back 10 feet and landed...

So what was it they were trying to kill? After all, the sign standing near the Tallahatchie River is cratered by dozens of bullet holes. More than idle target practice. It suggests a frenzy of gunfire, an attempt to kill something. And the something is not really that hard to name. Memory. They...

“Why haven't you reported that Colin Kaepernick's actions are due to his radical Muslim beliefs? Why are you covering this up?” So reads an email sitting in my inbox. Not shockingly, Snopes, the fact-checking website, has rated the claim it makes as false. Kaepernick, an NFL quarterback, did not...

“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” —John 8:32 Or maybe not. Far be it from me to correct Jesus, but to survey the modern political landscape is to see precious little evidence of the truth setting anyone free. Indeed, it is to become convinced that a great many would...

Let me tell you how I got in trouble with ladies. No, not "the" ladies. Not, in fact, female human beings, period. Rather, I'm talking about the word itself, "ladies." Years ago, my editor was a female human being named Emily to whom I filed a piece that used the L-word as a synonym for women....

“What sort of people are we, we Americans? Today, we are the most frightening people on this planet.” — Historian Arthur Schlesinger As these words are written, I am on a cruise ship pulling into the harbor of the Greek island of Crete. All around me, the morning sparkles. The water is placid,...

Dear Snoop Dogg: You could have been honest about it. If you had, I'd still think you wrong as two left shoes, but at least I could give you points for guts. As it is, I can only shake my head in appalled wonder at your entirely gutless Instagram attack on the remake of “Roots” that aired last...

Dear white people: As you no doubt know, the water crisis in Flint, Mich., has returned to the headlines with news that the state attorney general is charging three government officials for their alleged roles in the debacle. It makes this a convenient moment to deal with something that has irked...